It was a dangerous morning on Black Friday at a West Michigan Wal-Mart.

An impatient crowd stormed the doors in the mad rush to get to those door-buster deals inside.

It was an ugly scene when the doors opened at the Cascade Township Wal-Mart. Hundreds of shoppers pushed and shoved their way into the store, trampling a number of customers, sending two to the hospital.

At 5:00 a.m. the doors opened, holiday shoppers rushed in, and immediately one customer is pushed to the ground.

"This is ridiculous. I do not want my life in danger for this," said shopper Karen Dietstra. "This is not worth it. This has been a tradition for years. I don't think that I have to get beat up to try to get a sale."

Two shoppers from Grand Rapids did. One of them, 13-year-old Deja McHerron, had to be taken away by ambulance.

"They stumbled over a pregnant lady and Deja was trying to help her get up. And they stumbled over her and they stepped on her back. And now she's going to the hospital," said McHerron's mother, Deborah.

Duretha Arnold-Youngblood, 37, was also taken to the hospital, complaining of an injured knee. Her husband, Johnny Youngblood, took issue with what he calls a lack of security. Youngblood believes Wal-Mart should hire trained uniformed security guards to help bring order to the early-morning holiday crowd and not leave those duties to Wal-Mart associates.

"They didn't have no security at all," said McHerron's sister, Sierra.

"Wal-Mart did not do enough to protect us," Dietstra said.

What went wrong? Managers at the Cascade Wal-Mart are not commenting at this time.

"Greedy" doesn't begin to describe the state of society today. People are just in too much of a hurry, expect things instantly, hate waiting. I have never seen so many grumpy looking, unhappy, impatient people shopping as I did this morning.

I will readily admit that there were Conservatives and Republicans probably among those in the crowd pushing, shoving, and eager to get their hands on goodies.

I will say that your above statement goes a long way to explaining the liberal American mindset.

They had a "win at all costs" attitude during the election (vandalizing the cars of Bush supporters, slashing GOP staffers cars on election day, irrational shouting...).

They expect the war to be over in a day and New Orleans to be restored overnight.

Sitcoms solve problems in 30 minutes (including 8 minutes of commercial breaks) and the "serious shows" get things resolved in under an hour.

Technology (and babies) are disposable these days, move on to the "Next Big Thing".

The X-Box that they fight over today will be the Cabbage Beanie Doll Baby that is ignored the next year.

The sickness of mind that is on exhibit is symptomatic of serious problems throughout our society.

There is no "waiting". Waiting for sex. Waiting to build support for the legislation you want. Waiting to buy what you can afford AFTER you have paid for your necessities.

Self-reliance is a thing of the past (which is why they blame the store's "lack of security" rather than themselves). There is far too little accountability today. The right's stance against abortion is not to "punish" the mother for having sex, it is because the baby should NOT be punished because it is "inconvenient" or "embarassing".

51
posted on 11/25/2005 3:13:13 PM PST
by weegee
(Christmas - the holiday that dare not speak its name.)

Fer cryin' out loud--if you shop on Black Friday, you'd better be prepared for this kind of nonsense. Personally, I avoid shopping on this day, unless it's online. There is nothing I want bad enough to make it worth putting up with Black Friday madness.

61
posted on 11/25/2005 3:27:57 PM PST
by MizSterious
(Anonymous sources often means "the voices in my head told me.")

Actually....I went to Walmart this morning and unbeknownst to me.....this other woman shopper had just picked up the last sewing machine I WANTED on sale for $55.00.....and when the sales lady told me that this lady here (pointing to the witch standing next to me) took the LAST ONE...this witch gave me a "HA HA TOO BAD FOR YOU" look....and I almost tackled her. There was no need for that kind of look. Witch.

Go figure the mentality of these greedy ba*tards. They knowingly stay up most of the night for the privilege of participating in a mob activity and then complain when they suffer the consequences. Judging from the pictures, some of these 'victims' were such because they couldn't move their fat a**es out of the way fast enough. That was probably the only exercise they got all year.

69
posted on 11/25/2005 3:41:58 PM PST
by varon
(Allegiance to the constitution, always. Allegiance to a political party, never.)

I cannot understand the mentality of waiting in line to go shopping. But I will not stand in line for anything. Stand in line to eat? NEVER...stand in line to see a movie? If it's longer than a two minute wait, I'm out of there. There was only one time I waited on line to get something...and that was the Cast recording of SUNDAY IN THE PARK WITH GEORGE ...signed by Mandy Patinkin, Bernadette Peters and, the most brilliant songwriter ever, STEPHEN SONDHEIM. He even talked to me....I told him I try to do the crossword puzzles he writes for the Sunday London Times. (Have you ever tried one of his puzzles?). I knew I would get his attention if I brought up his puzzles, not many people know he writes them.

What is the big deal about HDTV....and what other types of tv's are there?? My mother has a big tv--a slim one...but you can't see the picture from the side...and 'lamps' keep going on it....it's always dark. I'll stick with my regular old fashioned TV that looks better than my mothers $2,000 one.

For some reason, I would think that 'ADULTS' should act like 'ADULTS' instead of idiots?????

Maybe if we just walked, you know, one step at a slow speed in front of the other, we might get to where we are going????

I purposely did not go this morning at my local 'Black Friday' just because of this...people are idiots anymore, especially if they think they can save cent or two, and forget they need 'sense' to act like a respectable ADULT!!!

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